Especially with Brexit having just been voted on, this struck me as a lot of fun. And it comes with the opportunity to attend the Roald Dahl celebration in Wales. He's one of my favorite authors(for both kids and adult books), my son loved the BFG and Charlie and the Chocolate Factory (but was weirdly scared of the movie version of James and the Giant Peach) Anyway, Dahl is a favorite in this house, and I was intrigued.

PLEASE NOTE: This is not a sponsored post- (although, Great Britain tourism council or other councils , I'm always open for business!)

Punch and Judy show at Cardiff Castle.
Photo courtesy of walesonline.co.uk.
Photo by Richard Schindler

As I started to fill out the entry form, it asked me what giant British locations I'd like to visit. I assumed this was just a condition to prove that you and not a robot entered. Just in case, I looked at the Terms and Conditions, and was shocked to find something out. (Emphasis mine)

6. This is a game of skill, and chance plays no part in determining the winner. Each entry will be individually judged based on originality, creative merit and humour of the answer provided. The judging will take place on or around 3 August 2016 at the Promoter’s premises and the winner will be the entry that scored the highest in the opinion of the judges based on the judging criteria. The judges may select additional reserve entries which they determine to be the next best and record them in order of merit in case of an invalid entry or ineligible entrant.

Game of skill, eh? Most of these kinds of contests in the US are chance based. Challenge accepted!

I started writing a sonnet, but sonnets are hard, and getting a bunch of jokes and thoughts into it (as well as that damned iambic pentameter) was getting too hard, so after about half an hour, I saved what I could of the sonnet, and switched it to a more verse-like poem where the structure and verse is easier and I could play a little more. (Yeah, Doggerel!)

Here's the poem I wrote:

Big Ben, photo courtesy of wikipedia.

Let’s visit Britain on a 5 day tour

Explore all of England from shore to shore,

While we are there we’ll have loads of fun.

(Do you measure fun in stones or metric tonnes?)

Let’s go to Cardiff, the city by the sea

Watch Punch and Judy, laugh with glee.

Breathe in the salt and the fog and the fresh air

Listen to the sounds of the county fair.

Then to the middle to see the Pictish wonder

Stonehenge: ancient miracle or cosmic blunder?

As we see historic stones that have been split asunder

We might feel a chill from history (or perhaps its the thunder?)

Last stop London, cosmopolitan seat

Big Ben, Changing of the Guard, Get something to eat

Visit a museum, see the Crown Jewels.

Walk along the Thames, think of Shakespeare’s Fools.

On to the West End, to see a funny play

It’s almost time to end our trip, but that’s okay.

We’ve had a blast, checking out Eng-land.

Now all we have to do is win, wouldn’t that be grand?

Okay, so I'm not the best poet in the world, but it's got a rhyme scheme, it's got some humor, it mostly scans, and it was quick!

So I submit it, but there's an error-- it tells me that it has to be less than 140 characters! Yikes-- I just spent like an hour between writing the sonnet, and then changing it to this doggerel.

Undaunted, I pared it down to the size of a tweet and entered.

Please enter if you are intrigued as well. It would be great if I inspired someone to win! (Of course, it would be even better if I won, but you can't have everything!)